The Industrial Internet of Things FEATURE NEWS

Qualcomm Extends Benefits of 802.11ad Wi-Fi to Enterprises

Qualcomm Technologies has announced that it will bring its 802.11ad Wi-Fi technology to a variety of enterprise and outdoor environments in order to offer multi-gigabit wireless connectivity to address the requirements of enterprises and carriers looking to improve network capacity and deliver fixed broadband access. Qualcomm Technologies is working with enterprise OEMs to bring tri-band access points and outdoor products to market this year.

Offering multi-gigabit speeds in the relatively interference-free 60 GHz band, 802.11ad is designed to provide customers with a robust, cost-effective alternative to fiber and cable deployments. This latest 802.11ad chipset combines the QCA6335 baseband and QCA6310 RF transceiver, which reportedly uses up to 256 antenna elements to maintain robust wireless connections for outdoor and long-range deployments. It also brings specific benefits to demanding enterprise environments, including advanced beamforming and beam steering features to maintain strong connections in dense environments, highly-accurate positioning, as well as a low-power CMOS design to meet enterprise Power over Ethernet (PoE) requirements.

“802.11ad holds great promise for a wide variety of consumer applications, and can now provide enterprises and carriers with a highly robust and cost-effective way to extend their networks indoors and out,” said Irvind Ghai, VP, product management, Qualcomm Technologies. “Qualcomm Technologies is working with forward-thinking enterprise partners like MikroTik to take advantage of virtually untapped wireless spectrum to eliminate expensive fiber installs and unsightly aerial cable drops.”

Tri-band access points are ideal for traditional enterprise-class networks, the company said, because they augment Wi-Fi capacity in dense places like conference rooms, cubical environments, auditoriums and public venues. It supports Fast Session Transfer (FST) features to provide transition to 802.11ac when roaming.

Mikrotik, a provider of Internet connectivity devices, is using Qualcomm Technologies' 802.11ad solution to power its Wireless Wire 60G Gigabit Ethernet extender that provides advanced connectivity between buildings up to 100 meters.

“Our customers demand robust connectivity across campuses, and the unique characteristics of 802.11ad make it possible to offer a powerful, yet cost-effective alternative to cable and fiber,” said John Tully, CEO, MikroTik. “Qualcomm Technologies' strong enterprise presence and industry-leading 11ad technology helped us deliver a cutting-edge outdoor product with the right mix of performance, simple installation and cost-structure for the market.”